


The Protection

by trancer



Category: Once Upon a Time (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Dark, Dark Character, F/F, Femslash, Fingerfucking, Minor Character Death, Rough Sex
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-12-05
Updated: 2014-12-05
Packaged: 2018-02-28 07:04:19
Rating: Mature
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,440
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2723153
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/trancer/pseuds/trancer
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>A small tweak to Pan's curse has unforeseen consequences. Five years later, Ruby Lucas returns home. (Darkish Ruby; mentions of character deaths that I'll go ahead and spoil - Hook, Walsh)</p>
            </blockquote>





	The Protection

"Ruby, you have to come back." Was all the message on the machine said, the voice unrecognizable. "She needs you."

It's been five years since Ruby was last in Storybrooke.

She stands in the only building remaining, the mansion on Mifflin Street. A burnt out shell of its former glory, broken windows and crumbling walls, crawling ivy and wet moss. Glass crunches under her boots as she walks, rats and roaches skittering out of the way.

There's no point in calling out, Ruby knows exactly where to go. She opens the door to the vault. A light, yellow and orange, flickers on and off, on and off, like a broken fixture. When Ruby enters the main room, the light goes out.

"My son?" A voice from the darkness calls to her.

"He's fine," Ruby shifts on the balls of her feet, sinks her hands into the pockets of her jacket. "Graduated the top of his class. In a month, he'll be going to MIT."

"Is he happy?"

Lips pursing, Ruby furrows her brows. This wasn't the deal. "Is she.."

"Safe?" Regina cuts her off, practically snarling the word. "Your precious grandmother is back in the Enchanted Forest, all nice, cozy and filthy rich. Just like we agreed. Now tell me.."

The light flickers on, a yellow and orange ball of flame flickering in the palm of a hand. It's not that Ruby didn't expect this, she just couldn't fight the surprised gasp crawling up her throat. Regina sits on the remains of her throne, her red velvet dress threadbare, her eyes gaunt, skin sallow, still a Queen but a battle-worn one. "Is my son happy?"

"Yes," Ruby answers.

"And his mother?"

A flicker of guilt flashes in Ruby's eyes. Hand still in her pocket, her thumb traces over the gold band on her ring finger. "We have a deal."

"Mmm," she purrs, rising from her seat. With a wave of her hand, a half dozen sconces flicker to life, the flames illuminating the room. "A deal. Funny how I don't recall fucking the mother of my son as being part of it."

There's a limp in her step as she saunters across the room. Ruby hasn't been in Storybrooke in five years, doesn't mean she'd completely kept herself in the dark of the atrocities routinely befalling the little town. "Come back with me, Regina."

"I can't." Ruby sees a tiny glimpse of the other Regina, the mother, the lover, the one who sacrificed everything to protect the ones she loves. "It's still not safe. I will not risk his life for sentimentality."

The mother, the lover, the one too damn stubborn to ask for what she needs because she thinks it a weakness. Ruby petulantly stomps across the floor, ignores the glare of the Evil Queen as she stops, the two of them practically nose to nose. "Then take it," Ruby growls, grabbing Regina's hand and placing it palm flat to Ruby's chest. "Take what you need to keep him safe!"

The slightest of doubts colors Regina's eyes, a flicker of remembrance of the things they used to be to each other, warm beds, skin against skin, legs tangled together. Then, the Evil Queen returns, her gaze dark and hot and commanding. Fingers extend, flex, curling just enough so the tips dig into Ruby's flesh.

Regina takes.

A dry hot wind barrels through Ruby, changes her eyes to yellow, mouth going slack into a silent scream. The pain excruciating, her power, her strength, the very pieces of her soul ripped away and sucked into Regina.

Regina never more to take more than she needs, though she needs a lot this time, she pulls her hand from Ruby, breaking the connection. As Ruby slumps to her knees, chest panting and heaving, already her body healing. She lifts her head, watches as Regina brings her hand to her face, seductively licking her fingers.

"You're such a bitch," Ruby tiredly chuckles, dragging herself to her feet.

"And I like you better when you're on your knees."

"Always did."

Regina arches a brow. "Still do."

It's Ruby that crashes their lips together, clasping Regina by the jaw, reeling her in. Regina never takes more than she needs, always leaves enough for this. Ruby pushes until Regina's backed against a wall. Her hands slide to perfect breasts, cupping and kneading through the velvet of Regina's gown. Tongue swirling against Regina's teeth, eating the moan as Ruby pinches both nipples.

Then, she's groping and fumbling, pulling at Regina's dress until the material is hiked above her hips. Regina already lifting a leg draping it over the anchor of Ruby's thigh, slightly bent, knee pinned to the wall. Ruby slides a hand between them, groans at the feel of skin already heated warm and just as wet. They groan together, three fingers pushed deep and hard. Regina jutting her hips, setting the pace. And it's all urgent and desperate because neither know when this will happen again, if it will ever happen again. The always failing connection between them, an inexperienced fairy with a handful of pixie dust. A young wolf passed out in the back of the bar, commiserating over her new, badly done tattoo - a drawing of a wolf that looked a lot like a lion. Ruby hates cats.

There's just this now. A tiny shared moment, the ache of what was, resentment towards what could never be. The hunger to make it last, linger long after the heat between them has faded. Ruby curls her fingers, growls at the way Regina moans, the nails digging in her scalp. Regina leaving marks in her own way. Ruby can't help but do the same, lips suckling at that point on Regina's neck, skin pulled between tightly held teeth. As she curls her fingers just a little more, drives a little deeper, a little harder.

The throaty wail erupts from Regina's throat, rattles the walls, flames flickering to darkness before rising back up. The smallest burst of magic, a liquid heat that Regina allows to sear her insides. Ruby the only one to ever get so close without being burnt.

Ruby stills, just enough to hold Regina as she comes down, all panting, quivering and clinging. The instinctual carnal knowledge of two souls destined to be mates. Because, when Regina finally calms, Ruby descends. Licks clean the insides of still quivering thighs, moves higher, lapping and licking long after she's had her fill. When it's her tongue plunging into tight wetness, and hands clawing at her scalp, quietly begging for mercy as another wail erupts from Regina's throat.

Leaning back on her heels, Ruby gazes upwards, all wolfish grin and glistening chin. To see those dark eyes, that seductive grin gazing back down at her. The Wolf and her Queen, the tiny shared moments when everything's as it's supposed to be. Ruby rises quickly, lips to Regina's, the kiss more passionate, more pleading. When they part, her hands are once again cupping Regina's face, foreheads touching. "Send the word and I will come back for you. You are a queen, *my* queen," she pauses, leans closer to bring her lips to Regina's ear, voice lowering to a whisper, "you will reign again. And this wolf will be at your side."

Regina pulls back, just enough to stare back into Ruby's eyes. That flicker of recognition, not the Evil Queen but the mother, the lover, the one willing to sacrifice it all for the ones she loves, grasping at the tiny bit of hope she's just been handed. The rewards of a deal that was more than about just protecting Henry.

Regina smiles, "You're coming back to me, regardless."

**

Snow White is waiting by Ruby's car. Not the Snow White from the storybooks, no this is the one the stories don't talk about, the thief in the forest, surviving in the battered remains of a non-existent town. Her long, black hair is dirty and matted, matching the smudges on her face, the stains on her clothes. On her hip is the baby, Neal. Ruby hasn't been in Storybrooke for over five years and the child is no older than a toddler. The child on one hip, Snow holds a car seat in the other, a bag at her feet.

"Are they safe? Henry and Emma?"

"Yes, Snow," Ruby sighs, hands tucking back into her jacket pockets. "They're safe." she stomps towards her car, towards the driver's door partially blocked by Snow. "I have to go."

"Hook?" she says, waits for Ruby's pause. "He crossed over, went to New York City to find them.."

"Hook's dead." Ruby skips the part where it was her that slit his throat, another unsolved murder, staining the streets of New York. The less said about Walsh, the better. Just a secret between Ruby and the rats who'd devoured his remains. If Zelena wanted Emma and Henry, she'd have to do better than a flying monkey.

"Take him with you!" Snow blurts. Eyes moist, pleading, a hint of madness. "The darkness is coming and David.." she falters, finds the tattered remains of the woman she's supposed to be, "I can't be what I need to be and keep him safe. He's just a baby. Once you cross the town line, it's okay if he doesn't remember."

"Snow.." Ruby closes her eyes, cranes back her neck, wishes for another curse. Anything but the memories of a time when they were friends, when the wolf served a different queen.

"He's Emma's brother." Snow jams the dagger in deep.

Ruby grits between her clenched teeth, arms already extending outwards, "Fucking Charmings." 

**

Ruby lies, spins a tale about a long lost cousin, a drunk driver, an orphaned little boy and Ruby the lone relative left to take care of him. Emma's superpower faulty enough to suspiciously believe. There's still a reunion to get to.

The sex is hard, sweaty and athletic. The fisting hand on the back of Ruby's head, as Emma drives the silicon shaft deep. Like she's the wolf, the one smelling the sex of another on what she considers hers. Ruby all too eager to be possessed, dominated, claimed. Like those times back when their memories were of a waitress in a dive bar, a bounty hunter between the hunting of prey. A bit of insurance by the caster of a curse, a way to bind Emma and Ruby together. So that when the memories turned real, Ruby's presence wouldn't feel like an intrusion.

If only she knew.

They're nothing but exhaustion now, sweat drying on skin and contented afterglow. Emma shifts. Still hungry, still filled with the need to dominate and possess. She crawls over Ruby, slides a hand between them. Ruby wet enough for another go, and Emma grips the shaft of her silicone cock, using her hips as leverage to ease it in. The pace is slow, languid, Emma practically wriggling her hips in a teasing motion.

Except, the heat doesn't quite reach her eyes, the gaze more examining than seductive. The bounty hunter unable to stop hunting prey. And Ruby stares back, fingers sliding down Emma's sides, slipping onto her back.

"Emma?"

"Who was she to you?"

The deal had been simple - Ruby would escape the curse along with Emma and Henry, in exchange for the safety and security of Ruby's grandmother. In exchange, Ruby would keep them safe. With one caveat - Emma and Henry must never get their memories back.

A task easier said than done. Emma, the woman with trusts issues and her son, a boy with an aggressive curiosity. Five years and a hundred different close calls, strange dreams and phantom memories that still emerged despite the curse. They were Charmings, family always fated to find each other no matter the circumstances. The phantom awareness that the rest of their family was still out there, a family that needed them.

Ruby did as she always does in these moments. She lies. Because the best lies are always the ones wrapped in a kernel of truth. "A fairy tale story," she watches her fingers as they drift over Emma's forehead, tucking the hair behind an ear. "By an author with a twisted sense of humor, a well empty of the ink meant for happy endings."

"And the baby?" Emma pinches her brows, sifting through the words, trying to find the truths and the lies. "Lawrence Talbot?"

Ruby can't help but snicker at her own inside joke. She could raise a Charming, she just couldn't do it with one named after Emma's dead boyfriend. Her smile is soft but stern. This time, there are no lies. "He's family."

An oncoming curse, the off chance that Pan wasn't as smart, wasn't as powerful, Regina picking the one person just crazy enough to try and escape it. They were characters in a storybook, written by an author with a twisted sense of humor, a sadistic idea of fate. But, Ruby's seen something unexpected, the pages of a new book. One in which their tangled fates had yet to reach. A time when the memories would return. When the Savior and the Heart of the Truest Believer would return to the Enchanted Forest.

A time when a Wolf returned to the side of her Queen.

"Family," Emma settles, leaning in for a kiss as her hips began a new rhythm. "Are you sure you're ready to raise a baby?"

"I don't know," Ruby smirks back. "Are you?"

"Are we really doing this?"

"Probably should have thought about that before you put a ring on my finger."

"Yeah, maybe. I'm just happy you slowed down enough to let me catch you." She shifts, pulling Ruby up with her, arranging the two of them until Ruby's straddling her lap, Emma sitting on her knees. "Have to say, it still feels like I'm competing with someone who's no longer there."

"Is that what this is about? Someone feeling a little threatened?"

"Taunts the woman about to get fucked like its going out of style. Say it," she breathes into Ruby's smiling lips. "Say you love me."

The part of the plan that wasn't supposed to happen. Get close, protect them, keep them safe. There was no time to discuss falling in love. No time to contemplate a fate outside the pages of a storybook.

Ruby was a wolf always meant to serve a queen. Married to a woman with no idea she's the heir to a kingdom. As she tightens the legs wrapped around Emma's waist, draws her arms over Emma's shoulders, Ruby can only wonder..

"I love you."

If it's possible to serve both.

END


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